the smell of fear, then jumped again when a loud bwarrrr-bwarrr sawed across the deck above them.
She closed her eyes and made a deal with God.
Let him live, Lord. Let him live, and I’ll keep my end of the bargain. Let him live, and I’ll never make him choose between my friendship and my love. Just…let him live.
* * *
1:14 a.m.…
“On the right! On the right!” Bran bellowed to the Coast Guardsman standing at the 50-caliber machine gun mounted on a swivel on the portside of the bow.
No sooner had Bran and Mason watched the dead bodies of the men who’d been trying to sneak aboard the cutter slip back into the sea than the sound of return gunfire echoed from the cruising boat. Only it hadn’t been return gunfire. At least the shooters hadn’t returned fire at Bran and Mason.
Instead, the yachtsmen had pulled pistols and carelessly put bullets into the brains of the medic and the Guardsmen who’d boarded with him. Bran had peeked around the corner of the cutter’s bridge house in time to see blood spraying from their skulls as their bodies crumpled to the deck.
One of the Coasties still on the cutter had screamed his rage before rushing over to the closest 50-cal. and letting loose with a barrage of lead that chewed up the side of the yacht and took down one of the mercs. The Guardsman was still laying on the trigger, doing his damndest to destroy the vessel all by himself.
The ping-ping of empty shell casings was a sweet melody compared to the loud roar of the weapon. The smell of spent gunpowder hung heavy in the air.
“On your right!” Bran bellowed again, flaying his vocal cords in an effort to be heard. The merc the Guardsman had missed was bellied up to the edge of the yacht’s deck, aiming his pistol straight at the head of the Coastie. And Bran didn’t have a shot. Because of the angle, the Guardsman’s head kept slipping into his line of fire.
“Mason!” he yelled over his shoulder. Mason had moved to the back end of the bridge house. “You got a shot?”
“Negative!” Mason yelled back.
“Shit,” Bran cursed, once again sighting through his scope. “Come on! Come on!” he gritted between his teeth. “Keep your head to the left. Just keep your goddamn head to your left!”
Bran’s heart slowed. The breath left his lungs on a hot breeze. And the world around him disappeared until there was nothing. Nothing but the two-inch piece of real estate between the eyes of the mercenary when the Guardsman finally shifted left.
Boom! He squeezed his trigger. His bullet flew true, plowing into the merc’s skull and killing him instantly. But it was too late. The mercenary got off his shot. And the Coastie dropped to the deck, clutching his neck as dark, wet blood spurted between his fingers.
“Damnit!” Bran yelled. Then, “Mason! Cover me!”
Bran waited until Mason raced back to him before scooting from behind the bridge house to snake his way across the deck towards the writhing Guardsman. After the roar of the 50-cal., the silence that hung over both ships was eerie, weighty, like that inside a casket six feet below freshly shoveled earth. It was made even more macabre when the wounded man began to gurgle.
Bran slung his M4 across his back and grabbed the Coastie beneath both arms. As quickly as he could, bare feet sliding on the slick deck, he dragged the man backward, toward what little safety the far side of the bridge house provided.
“P-please help,” the Guardsman burbled, blood staining his lips.
“I’m doing my best, buddy,” Bran told him, grunting as he finally managed to heave the wounded man around the corner.
He was down on his knees a second later. “Let me see.” He gently removed the Coastie’s hands. Carnage met Bran’s eyes and a hard stone of remorse settled low in his gut. Carefully applying pressure to the awful wound on the man’s neck, he looked up to see the muscle beneath Mason’s eye twitching. They both knew a mortal injury when they saw one. The Guardsman only had a minute or two of this world left in him, and then he’d be on to the next.
“H-help me,” the Coastie pleaded again.
Bran gave him the only help, the only comfort he could. “You are one brave sonofabitch jumping on that saw gun like you did. May have saved everyone on this boat.”
The man’s eyes focused on Bran’s face, wide and terrified. “Am